Palantir to bolster $15 billion valuation with new round of funding

CIA-based data analytics company Palantir Technologies graced headlines in December 2013 over the fact that its valuation had shot up from $6 billion to $9 billion in less than three months. The secretive firm is once again in the news for the same reason as its valuation continues to climb.

Palantir was valued at $15 billion late last year according to people familiar with the matter as reported by Bloomberg. To get to that figure, the company raised a total of $500 million in a round of funding that wrapped up last November.

Not content to rest on its laurels, the analytics specialist is already in the process of raising a new round of funding.

A valuation of $15 billion makes it the third most valuable company backed by venture capitalists in the world according to a separate report from The Wall Street Journal. Only Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi and ride sharing specialist Uber have higher valuations at $45 billion and $41 billion, respectively.

The 11-year-old firm was co-founded by early Facebook investor Peter Thiel in 2004 and is currently led by Alex Karp, described as a philosopher-turned-money manager for the one percent prior to joining Palantir.

Their bread and butter is a software tool that allows government agencies to visualize and build relationships from large amounts of data such as bank records, photos of license plates, phone numbers or even friend lists.

The last time we heard about Palantir was in December 2013 when its valuation had shot up by $3 billion in less than three months.